Frequently slow interface on Ubuntu 12.10, 12.04, . .

[msinfo]

Hi,
About my system :
Dual boot Window7/Ubuntu
RAM : 1 GB
CPU : Intel® Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.20GHz × 2
OS type: 32 bit
Disk : 50 GB
Driver : VESA: Intel(r)915G/915GV/910GL Graphics
Experience : Standard

I have been using on this machine since, version 8.04 LTS. But from, 10.04, I have been having problem of slow interface, which happens, most of times, whenever I install updates. But not all update makes interface slow. So sometimes, I enjoy Ubuntu with fast navigation.

Unity, GNOME, Unity 2D, all suffer from this problem. I also tried various kernel versions, but no change.

Slow interface : App laoding speeds, maximise minimise and everything else is sluggish and feels unresponsive.

Can some one give me idea, how to diagnose this issue, and resolve it, because it has been pestering since long time.

]This is result of top command (when chrome, gedit, and one terminal was open, but still interface/gui navigation was slow) :


top - 05:05:36 up 19 min, 2 users, load average: 3.25, 2.72, 1.86
Tasks: 162 total, 1 running, 161 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
%Cpu(s): 47.6 us, 5.5 sy, 0.2 ni, 24.2 id, 22.5 wa, 0.0 hi, 0.1 si, 0.0 st
KiB Mem: 1018804 total, 942812 used, 75992 free, 10404 buffers
KiB Swap: 1951740 total, 2612 used, 1949128 free, 364448 cached


PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
2162 someone 20 0 407m 175m 31m S 81.9 17.6 14:07.98 compiz
1592 root 20 0 104m 49m 7348 S 18.9 5.0 1:58.85 Xorg
3082 someone 20 0 95752 15m 10m S 6.3 1.5 0:02.26 gnome-terminal
3156 someone 20 0 5204 1276 980 R 6.3 0.1 0:00.01 top
1 root 20 0 3624 1892 1240 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.99 init
2 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kthreadd
3 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.16 ksoftirqd/0
5 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.53 kworker/u:0
6 root rt 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.01 migration/0
7 root rt 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 watchdog/0
8 root rt 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 migration/1
9 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.10 kworker/1:0
10 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.15 ksoftirqd/1
11 root rt 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 watchdog/1
12 root 0 -20 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 cpuset
13 root 0 -20 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 khelper
14 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kdevtmpfs

[varunendra]

Sluggishness problems are almost always caused due to improper drivers, most often the display driver. And this doesn't look good to me -


Driver : VESA: Intel(r)915G/915GV/910GL Graphics
How did you get the above output?

For Intel 915 series graphics, I believe the correct driver is i915 which is part of the Linux kernel. So why are you using the Vesa driver (if I am interpreting the output correctly)?

If you are indeed using the vesa driver, I'm sure that is what is causing the sluggishness. The rest of your hardware is although old, yet sufficient enough to give decent performance with Ubuntu (assuming the CPU is a dual core, or hyper-threading enabled).

The CPU usage by compiz, as shown in your above outputs, is insane (about 82%). But I think it should go down once the proper driver is loaded. Otherwise you may have to consider lighter variants of Ubuntu.

Also, you may get better help if you could post a detailed report of your hardware, which means the output of -

sudo lshw -numeric -sanitize

[msinfo]

How did you get the above output?

I got output by clicking right most icon on task bar > About this computer.



So why are you using the Vesa driver (if I am interpreting the output correctly)?

I don't know how one configure, this drivers. I am using defaults. But still, some days, it works just fine.



If you are indeed using the vesa driver, I'm sure that is what is causing the sluggishness.

How do we check that? And how should I switch, to another one?



The CPU usage by compiz, as shown in your above outputs, is insane (about 82%). But I think it should go down once the proper driver is loaded. Otherwise you may have to consider lighter variants of Ubuntu.

I started, checking on it, during initial start up of Ubuntu, indeed it goes up to 80-90%, but gradually moves between, 40-60%. Is it normal? Is compiz very essential component? What I understand, from reading Wikipedia, it is just related to effects. So is it possible to remove it completely, or install some other alternative?



Also, you may get better help if you could post a detailed report of your hardware, which means the output of -

sudo lshw -numeric -sanitize



computer
description: Desktop Computer
product: PROD00000000
vendor: OEM00000
width: 32 bits
capabilities: smbios-2.3 dmi-2.3 smp-1.4 smp
configuration: boot=normal chassis=desktop cpus=1
*-core
description: Motherboard
product: 8I915ME
vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
physical id: 0
version: x.x
*-firmware
description: BIOS
vendor: Award Software International, Inc.
physical id: 0
version: F5
date: 01/03/2006
size: 128KiB
capacity: 320KiB
capabilities: pci pnp apm upgrade shadowing cdboot bootselect edd int13floppy360 int13floppy1200 int13floppy720 int13floppy2880 int5printscreen int9keyboard int14serial int17printer int10video acpi usb ls120boot zipboot biosbootspecification
*-cpu:0
description: CPU
product: Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.20GHz
vendor: Intel Corp.
physical id: 4
bus info: cpu@0
version: 15.4.1
serial: [REMOVED]
slot: Socket 775
size: 3200MHz
capacity: 4GHz
width: 32 bits
clock: 200MHz
capabilities: boot fpu fpu_exception wp vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe nx constant_tsc pebs bts pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl cid xtpr
configuration: id=0
*-cache:0
description: L1 cache
physical id: a
slot: Internal Cache
size: 16KiB
capacity: 16KiB
capabilities: synchronous internal write-back
*-cache:1
description: L2 cache
physical id: b
slot: External Cache
size: 1MiB
capacity: 2MiB
capabilities: synchronous internal write-back
*-logicalcpu:0
description: Logical CPU
physical id: 0.1
width: 32 bits
capabilities: logical
*-logicalcpu:1
description: Logical CPU
physical id: 0.2
width: 32 bits
capabilities: logical
*-memory
description: System Memory
physical id: 1b
slot: System board or motherboard
size: 1GiB
*-bank:0
description: DIMM [empty]
product: None
vendor: None
physical id: 0
serial: [REMOVED]
slot: A0
*-bank:1
description: DIMM 400 MHz (2.5 ns)
product: None
vendor: None
physical id: 1
serial: [REMOVED]
slot: A1
size: 1GiB
width: 64 bits
clock: 400MHz (2.5ns)
*-bank:2
description: DIMM [empty]
product: None
vendor: None
physical id: 2
serial: [REMOVED]
slot: A2
*-bank:3
description: DIMM [empty]
product: None
vendor: None
physical id: 3
serial: [REMOVED]
slot: A3
*-cpu:1
product: Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.20GHz
vendor: Intel Corp.
physical id: 1
bus info: cpu@1
version: 15.4.1
serial: [REMOVED]
size: 3200MHz
width: 32 bits
capabilities: fpu fpu_exception wp vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe nx constant_tsc pebs bts pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl cid xtpr
configuration: id=0
*-logicalcpu:0
description: Logical CPU
physical id: 0.1
width: 32 bits
capabilities: logical
*-logicalcpu:1
description: Logical CPU
physical id: 0.2
width: 32 bits
capabilities: logical
*-pci
description: Host bridge
product: 82915G/P/GV/GL/PL/910GL Memory Controller Hub [8086:2580]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
physical id: 100
bus info: pci@0000:00:00.0
version: 0e
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
configuration: driver=agpgart-intel
resources: irq:0
*-display UNCLAIMED
description: VGA compatible controller
product: 82915G/GV/910GL Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:2582]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
physical id: 2
bus info: pci@0000:00:02.0
version: 0e
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm vga_controller bus_master cap_list
configuration: latency=0
resources: memory:f0100000-f017ffff ioport:c000(size=8) memory:e0000000-efffffff memory:f0180000-f01bffff
*-pci
description: PCI bridge
product: 82801 PCI Bridge [8086:244E]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
physical id: 1e
bus info: pci@0000:00:1e.0
version: d4
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pci subtractive_decode bus_master cap_list
resources: ioport:a000(size=4096) memory:f0000000-f00fffff
*-network
description: Ethernet interface
product: RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ [10EC:8139]
vendor: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. [10EC]
physical id: 5
bus info: pci@0000:01:05.0
logical name: eth0
version: 10
serial: [REMOVED]
size: 100Mbit/s
capacity: 100Mbit/s
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm bus_master cap_list ethernet physical tp mii 10bt 10bt-fd 100bt 100bt-fd autonegotiation
configuration: autonegotiation=on broadcast=yes driver=8139too driverversion=0.9.28 duplex=full ip=[REMOVED] latency=64 link=yes maxlatency=64 mingnt=32 multicast=yes port=MII speed=100Mbit/s
resources: irq:21 ioport:a000(size=256) memory:f0000000-f00001ff
*-multimedia UNCLAIMED
description: Multimedia audio controller
product: 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) AC'97 Audio Controller [8086:266E]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
physical id: 1e.2
bus info: pci@0000:00:1e.2
version: 04
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm bus_master cap_list
configuration: latency=0
resources: ioport:c400(size=256) ioport:c800(size=64) memory:f01c1000-f01c11ff memory:f01c2000-f01c20ff
*-isa
description: ISA bridge
product: 82801FB/FR (ICH6/ICH6R) LPC Interface Bridge [8086:2640]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
physical id: 1f
bus info: pci@0000:00:1f.0
version: 04
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: isa bus_master
configuration: latency=0
*-ide
description: IDE interface
product: 82801FB/FW (ICH6/ICH6W) SATA Controller [8086:2651]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
physical id: 1f.2
bus info: pci@0000:00:1f.2
version: 04
width: 32 bits
clock: 66MHz
capabilities: ide pm bus_master cap_list
configuration: driver=ata_piix latency=0
resources: irq:19 ioport:1f0(size=8) ioport:3f6 ioport:170(size=8) ioport:376 ioport:f000(size=16)
*-serial UNCLAIMED
description: SMBus
product: 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) SMBus Controller [8086:266A]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
physical id: 1f.3
bus info: pci@0000:00:1f.3
version: 04
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
configuration: latency=0
resources: ioport:500(size=32)
*-scsi
physical id: 2
logical name: scsi0
capabilities: emulated
*-disk
description: ATA Disk
product: ST3500418AS
vendor: Seagate
physical id: 0.0.0
bus info: scsi@0:0.0.0
logical name: /dev/sda
version: CC46
serial: [REMOVED]
size: 465GiB (500GB)
capabilities: partitioned partitioned:dos
configuration: ansiversion=5 sectorsize=512 signature=20d43eee
*-volume:0
description: Windows NTFS volume
physical id: 1
bus info: scsi@0:0.0.0,1
logical name: /dev/sda1
version: 3.1
serial: [REMOVED]
size: 98MiB
capacity: 100MiB
capabilities: primary bootable ntfs initialized
configuration: clustersize=4096 created=2010-12-10 05:12:32 filesystem=ntfs label=System Reserved state=clean
*-volume:1
description: Windows NTFS volume
physical id: 2
bus info: scsi@0:0.0.0,2
logical name: /dev/sda2
version: 3.1
serial: [REMOVED]
size: 93GiB
capacity: 93GiB
capabilities: primary ntfs initialized
configuration: clustersize=4096 created=2010-12-10 05:12:38 filesystem=ntfs state=clean
*-volume:2
description: Windows NTFS volume
physical id: 3
bus info: scsi@0:0.0.0,3
logical name: /dev/sda3
version: 3.1
serial: [REMOVED]
size: 217GiB
capacity: 218GiB
capabilities: primary ntfs initialized
configuration: clustersize=4096 created=2010-12-09 15:21:45 filesystem=ntfs label=New Volume state=clean
*-volume:3
description: Extended partition
physical id: 4
bus info: scsi@0:0.0.0,4
logical name: /dev/sda4
size: 154GiB
capacity: 154GiB
capabilities: primary extended partitioned partitioned:extended
*-logicalvolume:0
description: Linux filesystem partition
physical id: 5
logical name: /dev/sda5
capacity: 245MiB
*-logicalvolume:1
description: Linux swap / Solaris partition
physical id: 6
logical name: /dev/sda6
capacity: 1906MiB
capabilities: nofs
*-logicalvolume:2
description: Linux filesystem partition
physical id: 7
logical name: /dev/sda7
capacity: 105GiB
*-logicalvolume:3
description: Linux filesystem partition
physical id: 8
logical name: /dev/sda8
logical name: /
capacity: 46GiB
configuration: mount.fstype=ext2 mount.options=rw,relatime,errors=remount-ro state=mounted

[mörgæs]

A fresh install of X/Lubuntu 13.10 is a better option than Ubuntu.

[msinfo]

What I end up doing is :
Installed gnome fallback session, and it's working fine. But don't know whether this thing, give rise to problem of missing sound card from audio devices.
Currently enjoying fast navigation and interface, but without sound.

Thanks for your thoughts.

[msinfo]

I heard from my other peers too. They said, "indeed, Lubuntu, is good for my kind of machine. Will try it soon.